


breathe me right

by monkkeyslut



Category: Free!
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-10
Updated: 2014-07-10
Packaged: 2018-02-08 07:07:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,765
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1931364
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/monkkeyslut/pseuds/monkkeyslut
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The problem is, Gou doesn't know what she wants.</p>
            </blockquote>





	breathe me right

**Author's Note:**

> I literally wrote all of this in one sitting, and it's the most I've written in forever. Hopefully this means my writer's block is over.

 

“Kami,” Mikoshiba sighs, cupping his face between two hands. Gou can just hear him over her brother’s scolding voice, and she aches to turn around and snap at him when he continues, “She is just so cute.”

She doesn’t, because she’s a lady and her mother’s daughter, but still. The thought is there and very promising. Unfortunately, she has bigger worries, like Rin yelling at her in front of her team.

“—into the guy’s change room, Gou! Especially not with a camera! Not only could you have been scarred for life, it’s like a violation of privacy!”

“Oh Rin-chan!” Nagisa coos behind him, holding his hands to his chest in a praying manner. “It’s not a big deal!”

Rin whips around to rip into Nagisa, and Gou takes it as an opportunity to slip away. Mikoshiba sighs again as she passes but she’s too angry and embarrassed to do anything about it. How dare her brother yell at her in front of everyone!? Where did he get off being such a hypocrite when she knows Sousuke has been spying on her team swimming! Gou has half a thought to turn around and tell him such, because he should really be yelling at him, but when she turns around she slams into warm muscles and is briefly distracted.

The younger Mikoshiba grabs her upper arms as she bounces off his chest, losing her balance slightly. His cheeks flare bright red and Gou surpresses a smile when he immediately lets go of her arms as if she’s burning him. She deflates almost seconds later when she realizes her plan to wear her bikini top beneath her tank top to the joint practice has only caught the attention of her own stalker. Oh well.

“S-so sorry Gou-kun—er, -chan? Gou-chan!” The flush in his cheeks spreads down his neck and onto his chest, and despite how cute he’s actually being, he just called her Gou-kun.

He must understand the pure annoyance on her face, because he steps further away from her and rubs the back of his neck sheepishly. “Um,” he laughs, and then thrusts a hand out to her. “Mikoshiba Momotarou. We met a few weeks ago, but I was dragged off before we could talk and I don’t know if you caught my name then. Um—your brother calls you Gou, but…do you not like that?”

Nagisa, having recovered spectacularly from Rin’s outburst, gives her the eyes over  Mikoshiba—Momotarou’s—shoulder, eyebrows waggling in ways that seem nearly impossible. Gou flushes despite herself and returns her gaze to Momotarou’s, tucking a piece of hair behind her ear. “I prefer Kou, actually. Thank you for asking.”

He jerks his head in what she assumes must be a nod and looks far more relaxed than he has in a while. “Well, I’m new to town, so I was wondering if maybe you would like to—“ he is cut off abruptly when three swimsuit clad figures tackle him into the pool, much to her brother’s annoyance.

She laughs despite being splashed by a large wave of water and squats down at the edge of the pool, startling Momotarou when he comes up for air, hair hanging limp over his eyes. Her brother is shouting at the three boys who tackled him—older boys, who claim it was for initiation, captain—and smiles. “I can meet you here tomorrow, if you’d like.” It’s not a question, and she can see that he understands.

“Do you like movies?” He asks, pulling himself up on the ledge so they’re nearly eye-to-eye. She marvels at how alike he and Seijuurou are. Their eyes are so similar, almost golden, and he has a small patch of freckles across his nose.

He’s cute.

Gou nods when she realizes he actually asked her a question. Almost as an afterthought she adds, “And dinner.”

“Excellent,” he grins just as one of the older boys pulls him back under the water by her brother’s command.

She gives him a dirty look, and is appalled to see him giving her the same.

**

Gou has surprised herself so much in the last few days that Momotarou pressing his mouth to her cheek while walking home should hardly come as a shock.

The date had been good, which she honestly had not expected. He had offered to buy her dinner, had bought her movie ticket while she insisted on paying for snacks, and had even offered to walk her home despite it being the opposite direction of Samezuka. Her experience with Mikoshibas' (well, Mikoshiba, singular) has been him calling her cute and stuttering questions at her (and she tries not to think about the trip everyone had taken in the Winter, because if she did than that would be all she thought about), so she didn’t hold the standards for her date too high with this Mikoshiba, but he’d gone and surprised her. Momotarou—he’d asked her to call him that almost immediately, and she had told him to call her Kou—was funny and liked to laugh and could actually talk to her without telling her how cute she was. Not that she minded, but being constantly reminded was exhausting.

He was a lot different than Seijuurou, and it was refreshing. Not that Sei being different was a bad thing, because Gou had kind of liked that about him, especially when they got past the awkward conversations and actually started talking. He was funny in his own way and confident and didn’t mind when she texted him at random hours of the day—in fact, he usually texted back immediately. She used to imagine what kind of boyfriend he would be like, what he would be like outside of swim practices and group hang outs, and then--

Gou was startled from her thoughts at the feel of Momotarou’s hand slipping into hers. It was warm and damp and he looked nervous for the first time that night. Her heart had started pounding when he touched her and continued to do so until they reached the train station.

“So,” Momotarou said as they stepped onto the illuminated platform. The wind blew her hair every which way, and the chill made her step closer. He caught her other hand and then they were standing parallel to each other, his eyes dark. “Did you have fun tonight?”

Staring at their hands, Gou nodded, peeking up at him through her eyelashes. The train station is nearly empty this late—only another couple and a hand full of men and women are scattered along the platform—but she is still nervous. “Yes,” she replied as his eyes darted to their hands. He tightens his hand around one, then the other, and she squeezes back. “I did.”

“Well you know what that means,” he proclaimed, and she heard the train’s horn a few miles away. “We need to go on another!”

At her wide-eyed look, Momotarou quickly backtracked. Gou tried very hard not to laugh. “Of course, that’s only if you want to!”

Part of her thinks, this is a bad idea, and it sounds strangely enough like Makoto. Gou squeezes his hand, and her reply is caught in the wind as the train comes to a stop behind her.

By the way he smiles, Gou figures she must have said yes.

**

They start to date, she supposes, and Nagisa is their biggest supporter.

“He is cute,” Nagisa said beside her, elbow propped up on her shoulder, even though he was hardly taller than her. Beside him, Rei choked. Gou threw her elbow into his ribs just for posterity but had to agree. Momotarou may not be as built as his older brother, but his back was beautiful and his chest made her drool and his face was pretty, too.

The beach was hot and the sand was hotter under her bare feet, but she wasn’t about to go and run into the water. Most of the guys there would make sure to dunk her under, and while she was hot, she didn’t like being attacked in the water.

So when someone proposed a game of beach volleyball, Gou was only too happy to join, dragging Nagisa and Rei up with her. “Iwatobi versus Samezuka!?” She calls out at the same time as Sousuke. They smile at one another, and he winks.

The teams end up uneven, and Gou knows that she’ll be the one who has to sit out because she is the only girl. The only one who looks bad when she announces she’s going for a walk to get an ice cream is Makoto, but she shrugs off his pitying look and heads toward the small shack down the beach that sells drinks and ice cream. Maybe she’ll get him one.

It seems like a much longer walk now that she’s started, and by the time she reaches the half-way point she is regretting not bringing her hat. Looking back over her shoulder, she can just see Sousuke spike the ball at Rei, who flinches away from it. Gou scowls back at them, a little annoyed that not even Momotarou had offered to come on the walk with her. What kind of boyfriend—

“Hey!” A familiar voice calls out, and Gou whips around to see the bane of her existence walking toward her, hand in the air and a small smile on his face. There is a girl with him—tall, redheaded and pretty—who looks just as cheerful as Seijuurou.

“Hi,” she mutters, wondering how rude she would look if she just walked past him. It probably wouldn’t do much good, because he’d either follow with the girl or they would head over to the rest of them and join their stupid game. Gou exhales through her nose and shields her eyes as she looks him over.

He’s gotten a little bigger in the arms she thinks since she’d last seen him, but not much. He’s still beautiful, which irritates and fascinates Gou simultaneously, and she can see that he and Momotarou don’t look that similar. Sei’s hair is redder and he doesn’t have freckles. Even their eyes are slightly different. She is so caught up in staring at him that she almost misses him introduce the girl at his side as his sister.

“This is Hiroko, my sister. She’ll be starting high school in the fall, and…” Gou stops listening after high school because the girl standing in front of her does not look like a middle schooler, not with legs like that and not so tall. Gou glances down at her small stature and her short legs and buries her toes in the sand.

“That’s cool,” she says to be nice, smiling at the youngest Mikoshiba. She should not be surprised that they are all perfect. “Which school?”

“I don’t know,” she shrugs, voice quiet and unlike her brothers’. When she looks at Gou, her eyes widen and her hand flies to her mouth. “Oh!”

“What?” Both she and Sei ask together, leaning toward Hiroko, whose face looks very red.

Gou nearly walks out into the sea to drown when Hiroko squeaks out, “She’s so cute!”

Seijuurou laughs loudly, head thrown back to expose his neck. Gou very carefully does not lick her lips. “Yeah, she is, sis. Hey, why don’t you go see Momo and I’ll walk with Gou to wherever she’s going?”

“You don’t have to—“ Gou starts to say, but the words get caught in her throat when he looks at her. His gaze feels weighted and it is almost like the first time he’s looked at her today. She is suddenly very aware that all she has on is a bikini top and shorts that could pass for underwear maybe.

Hiroko looks between the two of them, eyebrows raised, before shrugging. “Ooookay,” she sings, starting to walk away. “Get me something yummy, Seijuurou!”

“Sure,” he calls back, not taking his eyes off of Gou. They stand there for a few moments before Gou starts walking, hands clasped tightly behind her back. He falls into step quickly, arms hanging loose at his side, almost like an invitation. They don’t talk and she almost wants to break the silence, but doesn’t know what to say. Why did you want to walk with me? What are you doing in town? Do you know I’m dating your little brother? Does it bother you?

Her mind is full of things she never said to him, things she wanted to and still wants to and she is suddenly very angry with herself. She’s dating his brother and she’s been trying not to think about him these past few months because it didn’t do any good when he was around, so what was she doing thinking about him now? Especially with his brother—her boyfriend!—around.

She’s angry with herself and with him. She’s sure Momotarou has spoken about her; he must have, since every one of his friends that she meets tells her how he can’t shut up about her. She grits her teeth when he gets close enough that their arms brush and nearly tells him to back off.

Instead, she asks, “What are you doing in town?” Because she is not a rude person and because the silence was making her think and that is the last thing she wants to do.

Sei looks at her, eyes searching, before saying, “Momotarou said there’ll be a tournament this week? Hiroko and I decided to come and watch. Hell, we might even compete.”

“You had to sign up a week ago,” Gou says before she can think better of it. Sei’s face falls a fraction, before the easy going smile is back.

“That’s fine, I don’t want to make Momo look bad,” he laughs again, and she wonders how it can be so easy. How can he laugh like that around her?

Gou sniffs, pointing her nose in the air as they arrive at the food stand, snapping, “Don’t worry, you wouldn’t.”

She can feel him deflate beside her, and it’s almost enough to make her turn around and apologize. It’s not like he’s being a jerk, and he probably didn’t mean to hurt her but…but Gou is much more like Rin than she likes to admit, and the two of them are very good at holding grudges, so she orders herself a popsicle. And if she splits it in half to give him the other piece well, it’s only because she couldn’t eat it all herself.

The walk back to the others is tense, and she can see that they’re finished the game. Good, she didn’t really want to spend any more time around Seijuurou than she had to. She almost thinks they’re going to make it back to the others without talking, but then Sei says quietly, “Can you tell me what I did?” And he sounds so absolutely oblivious and hurt that Gou stops walking.

He carries on a few steps before realizing she’s stopped, and when he turns around his face is red and his eyes are serious. Gou wonders if her face is red from the sun or from her own blush and her popsicle drips over her hand, leaving it sticky.

It isn’t his fault. It really, really isn’t. Sei might have thought she was cute, but he didn’t have a crush on her, not like she had on him. How could he have? He was a senior and a swim captain and popular and she was just Matsuoka Rin’s little sister. Besides, she never did much to show him she liked him. She could pretend all she wanted that those texts and the little inside jokes they had were something more, but Gou knew they weren’t.

And she had Momotarou. She really liked him.

Taking a deep breath, Gou looks out at the water. Sweat drips down between her shoulder blades and she wonders if it’s from the heat or something else. She should have just gone swimming and let the boys dunk her. It probably would have saved her this trouble.

“Gou?” Seijuurou prompts quietly, taking another step forward. His hand rests on her shoulder and Gou hates herself for the thickness in her throat and the stinging in her eyes. She hates him too, a little, however unfair it is.

“It’s nothing, Mikoshiba—“

She catches his flinch in the corner of her eye, but Momotarou is there and she bites back anything else she can say as his arms settle around her and spin her around. “Guess who won volleyball? It was this guy!” Gou’s arms come up automatically, clenching on his shoulders as he spins her around. She can’t hold back her laughter as he over balances and they nearly topple into the sand.

They recover quickly, but his arm stays around her waist, and when they look at Seijuurou, Gou can see the confusion, the realization, and something else, something that makes her stomach curl in a bad way and her jaw clench. Momotarou either doesn’t notice or doesn’t comment, just holds out his hand for a high-five.

Sei gives him one, though he looks reluctant. “It’s good to see you, Momo,” he says after a beat, his eyes on his brother’s arm around her. “This is your…?”

“My girlfriend,” Momotarou grins, pressing a sloppy kiss to her cheek that Gou would usually return with enthusiasm. Only this time, as the words register in Seijuurou’s mind, Gou wants to be as far away from the brothers as she can.

“Interesting,” is all Seijuurou says, before turning and walking toward the others. Gou pretends like her heart isn’t in her throat.

**

She’s started biting her nails again.

Gou grimaces as she catches Rei watching her with a look of disgust and pulls her thumb from her mouth, wiping it discreetly on her pant leg. She thanks whatever gods are watching that Rei is up next in their impromptu relay practice, because it saves her from being lectured. She is not so lucky when Makoto catches her the next time, because she knows him and she knows he won’t let it go.

And he doesn’t. They’re walking home after practice when Nagisa and Rei split off to go somewhere—Nagisa waggles his brows and shoots everyone a lot of winks, so no one is really sure where they plan to go, only what they plan to do—and Haru needed to run an errand before going home.

Gou was only a little shocked when Makoto denied the invitation to go with him, and only a little annoyed when he insisted on walking with her until they got to her house.

He doesn’t waste any time in asking, which Gou is grateful for. “It’s Mikoshiba, isn’t it?”

“Which one?” Gou laughs without humour, pulling her bag tighter to her side. She keeps her eyes on the road in front of her, because Makoto must be looking at her and she can’t handle that right now. It’s been a long week of avoiding Momotarou who has been hanging out with Sei and Hiroko non-stop, and she is very tired.

They walk in silence for a while, which is fine. Gou is comfortable with Makoto, enjoys being around him. Rin has labelled him the Team Mom more than once, but Gou finds that it isn’t exactly accurate. Makoto takes care of everyone, but there is something fierce underneath all his niceness, and she knows that he isn’t the saint everyone makes him out to be. Makoto has things he wants too.

Eventually, he bumps her as they walk, and she tears her eyes from the road. “What do you want, Kou?”

That’s another thing: he calls her what she wants to be called. She takes a deep breath and holds it until her chest burns. When she releases it, she isn’t any more resolved than she had been a minute ago. “I really like Momotarou,” she whispers helplessly, the but on the tip of her tongue. She almost continues, but I can’t stop feeling things for Seijuurou, does that make me a horrible person?

Makoto knows, though, just like she knew he would. “Did you ever tell him?”

“Did you?” They’ve stopped walking, and she instantly feels bad at the sad smile on Makoto’s face.

“No,” he says. “Sometimes it’s better not to.”

Gou shuts her eyes, not sure what he’s trying to say. Should she talk to Sei? Should she break up with Momo? Is it even worth it to do either?

(The truth is, if Makoto wasn’t so hung up on Haru, she bets she could love him a lot.)

She is about to start walking again when Makoto whispers, “And sometimes you need to do what your heart tells you to. What is your heart saying, Kou?”

That’s the problem, Gou muses, continuing her trek home. She doesn’t know what her heart is saying.

**

Momotarou presses his mouth against her insistently, his hands shaking as they press against her skin. Her shirt is rucked up under her bra, and Gou’s breath escapes her in a sigh as he mouths at her pulse.

It is the first time they’ve been together since Seijuurou and Hiroko came to town, and Gou’s chest feels very tight. It’s also the first time she and Momotarou have been like this and while it’s nice it just…it isn’t—

“Are you okay?” Momotarou asks, surfacing from her neck. His lips are swollen and red from where she’d bitten them, and his eyes look unfocused. Gou feels like she might burst or like maybe she’ll be sick, and this is a horrible way to end these types of situations (as far as she knows, since she has never been in one of these situations before) but she sits up quickly. He slides off of her easily and sits up beside her on his bed, but Gou can barely breathe. “Kou?”

“I need to go,” she gasps, sliding off of his bed and into her shoes before he can move. He calls her name and she can hear him getting up from the bed, but she’s too busy pulling her shirt back down and straightening her shorts. Her hands shake desperately and she needs to leave, needs air.

When she turns back to him, Momotarou is out of bed and a few steps away from her, hurt and confusion spread across his face. He looks so much like Seijuurou did the other day that her eyes water and Gou holds up her hands as if to ward him off. “I—I don’t feel good. I’m just, I need to go. I’m sorry.”

“At least let me walk you to the train station,” he begins, but she steps quickly away and her hand finds the door.

“I need to be alone.”

“Kou, you look like you’re going to be sick. I can’t just let you—“

“I’ll find Rin.” Gou feels like she might faint. Bile rises in her throat and she is out the door before he can say anything else. It’s so close to summer vacation that the dorms are nearly empty, and she only hopes that Rin is in his room or at least Nitori because she doesn’t think she can make it home on her own right now, doesn’t think she can do much beyond break down.

How stupid, she berates herself, turning another corner and stumbling down a flight of stairs. I’m so immature. I just left him standing there and he probably thinks I’m some kind of freak. The hallway leading to her brother’s room seems so much longer than usual, and she almost begins to cry when Sousuke, Haru and Rin exit the room, the former two clasping hands in some sort of agreement.

She must make a noise, because suddenly Rin is in front of her, holding her face and looking desperately for something she knows he won’t find. “Gou, what’s wrong? What’s happened, are you hurt? Are you—“

“I’m so stupid,” she blurts out, and then the tidal wave comes and she’s sobbing, pressing her face against his chest. He smells like the ocean and chlorine and home and Gou inhales after each sob, not sure when the last time her brother comforted her.

She can hear Haru and Sousuke, and she pulls away enough to speak before Rin can send them on the hunt. “It—it isn’t Momotarou’s fault,” she hiccups, watching the fear and rage leave her brother’s face. Even Haru and Sousuke relax beside them. “I just,” she tries, but she can’t catch her breath and—

And then Haru is there, pulling her from Rin and making her look at him. He looks calm and Gou latches onto that, tries to mimic him. Distantly, she hears him tell her to count, to close her eyes and focus on him. She does as he asks and hands find both of hers, unclenching them. By the time she is calm enough to speak, Sousuke and Rin look slightly less tense, and Haru offers her a hint of a smile. “Are you okay, now?”

“Yes,” she croaks, throat sore. Her face feels puffy and her eyes feel raw. She must look a mess because she certainly feels like one. “I’m sorry, that was stupid of me.”

“Don’t be sorry,” Sousuke says, and she sees that both he and Rin have her hands. “It happens to the best of us.”

“Come on,” Rin says, pulling her back to him and making his way to his room. Over his shoulder he tells Sousuke and Haru that he’ll talk to them later and to go on without him, and Gou feels ten inches tall.

She and Rin settle on his bed face to face, their hair mixing on his pillow. The last time they laid like this has been after their father’s funeral, and both their tears had been added to the mix. This is a slightly more refreshing change and Gou seeks out his hand between them.

“What happened?” Rin asks eventually, when her eyelids are beginning to get heavy. She blinks several times before yawning in his face, much to his chagrin.

“Why do the Mikoshiba boys have to be so cute?” She asks instead of answering, although it is sort of an answer in itself.

Rin’s eyebrows dip low before rising. “Damn Mikoshibas’,” Rin agrees quietly, knocking his fingers against her forehead. “Don’t let those pretty boy idiots bother you, Gou. You’re better than both of them combined.”

Her eyes water again, but she refuses to cry. “Why did he have to come back?” Gou whispers, voice raspy. “I was doing fine and then he had to come back and…” She pouts and presses her face into the pillow, ignoring Rin’s soft command not to make is damp from her crying.

“I didn’t think you liked that guy so much,” Rin sighs dramatically. “He had such a crush on you; I always wondered why he never asked you out.”

Gou lifts her face partially and glares at him, “What?”

Rin lifts an eyebrow, as if she should know this. “Yeah…I think he was going to and then you went to Okinawa with Tsugumi for most of the summer and well, he wasn’t coming back for another year so…”

Gou is about to open her mouth to yell at her stupid brother for not telling her this a year ago when someone pounds on his door, startling the both of them. They each sit up quickly, nailing their heads off the top bunk.

“Fuck!” Rin shouts, while Gou presses her sore forehead to her knees, biting her lip to hold back any curse words.

He stumbles to his feet to throw the door open, and then Momotarou is there. He looks crazed and desperate, his hair every which way, eyes wild until they settle on her, and then he just looks relieved. “Oh, thank Kami! I was so worried, I kept debating whether I should have gone after you and then my mom called so I—“

Rin smacks him over the head, still holding his forehead. “Gou, just shut the door when you leave, I’m going to the pool.”

He’s gone before either of them can do anything about it, and then they are alone and Gou knows she needs to end things, she just doesn’t know how.

Momotarou must sense that something is wrong—or maybe he never stopped. He pulls Rin’s desk chair over and sits on it while she faces him from the bed. He looks sad but he also looks like he understands.

He holds out his hand for her to take, but there isn’t anything about this that is romantic, and as she grabs it, Gou knows what to do.

**

Momotarou had taken everything surprisingly easy, and Gou loved him for that, if not anything else. He was an easy person to care about, and had things been different, Gou could have seen herself with him for the long run. But he had feelings for someone else and so did she.

He had mentioned after she told him about Seijuurou that he used to talk about a girl from Iwatobi and how much he liked her, how he thought he missed his chance. He never said a name and neither had Momotarou.

Gou told him that Nagisa said Nitori thought Momo was cute.

Needless to say, they parted as friends, and she was endlessly grateful for that.

**

Gou’s favorite thing about summer is the night time. The fireflies light up the beach and stars fill up the sky. The air is cool by the water, and the only sound for miles is the water and the sand shifting beneath your feet. When she goes to the beach at night, Gou can understand why Haru loves the water so much, why they all do really.

She shouldn’t be surprised to see him there; especially not after Momotarou told her he’d been going there since he got to town. Still, Gou’s heart began to race as she saw him sitting there with his Samezuka sweatshirt on and a pair of cargo shorts.

He looked up when she stopped beside him, and Gou could see the way his eyes took her in, seemed to drink her from the top of her head to her toes, and something like butterflies started in her stomach. “Can I sit?”

Seijuurou nodded, licking his lips before turning back to look at the water. He rested his chin on his folded arms and Gou pulled her knees to her chest, trying to see what he saw out on the waves. The water was calm and quiet, just a distant rush in her ears. She could hear their breathing more than she could hear the water, and she wondered if it was the same for him.

She didn’t come out there to sightsee, however. Gathering what was left of her courage, Gou murmured, “I broke up with Momotarou.”

Sei turned to look at her almost immediately, turning so his face was resting on his arms and his gaze was on her face. “Is that supposed to make me happy, Gou?”

Biting her lip, she pressed her face to her knees. “No. Maybe—I don’t know,” she laughs bitterly, twisting so she faced him. Water lapped against her toes, but she ignored it. “You’re so confusing, you know that?”

Something sparks in his eyes, and he mimics her position, “I’m confusing!?”

“Yes! You make it seem like—like you don’t want me or want to be with me!”

“When have I ever acted that way!?” He shouts and they both get to their feet, though she has no idea why. “I remember being very clear with how I felt. You were the one who never seemed sure about what she wanted.”

Gou blanches, turning away from him and hugging her arms to herself. Had she acted that way? She knows she wasn’t very reciprocal when she’d first met him, but she thought she had gotten better. They’d started talking and texting and…and…

“Maybe you’re right…” she admits, sucking her lower lip between her teeth. She would bite her nails if there were anything left to bite.

“I really liked you, Gou,” he tells her, sounding tired. She turns to see his hand pass over his face. “I thought when I came here this summer I could try again with you and then you acted like I was…like I was some kind of fungus and I realized you were the girl Momo mentioned all the time.” He looks at everything but her, and Gou finds herself stepping forward.

“Why didn’t you ever ask me out?”

Seijuurou looks off to the side, and it isn’t until her hands come up to cup his face that he looks at her mouth, and then her eyes. “Would you believe I was afraid you’d say no?”

She swallows past her dry throat. One of his hands comes up to cover hers and he turns until his mouth is pressed against her wrist, his eyes still locked on hers.

“You should try it now,” she isn’t sure why she’s whispering or why she’s standing chest to chest with him or why she’s on her tiptoes. “I already talked to Momotarou.”

“You did?” Sei whispers back, brows furrowed adorably. Gou reaches up with the hand not being held by his to smooth out the furrow.

“Yes. He doesn’t mind.”

She hears him swallow; can practically see the gears working in his mind. “Good. That’s good.”

Gou nods, biting her lip again. They’re close enough that she can feel his breath on her lips, the feel of his muscles against her chest.

“Gou,” he asks hesitantly, quietly. “Can I take you to dinner? Tomorrow, maybe?”

Her heart soars and Gou presses her mouth to his in a quickly, dry kiss. “Yes. Absolutely.”

Seijuurou laughs, full and bright and leans down to steal her lips in a kiss that leaves her mind reeling.

**

“I did not see this coming,” Sei whispers to her, one hand in her back pocket, the other holding an ice cream cone. In front of them, Momotarou is blushing and stammering as Nitori offers him half of his popsicle. It’s almost adorable, and Gou leans forward to steal a lick from Sei’s cone.

“Tell me about it,” she sighs, leaning back against his chest. She can feel his laughter reverberating through her back and she closes her eyes, enjoying the sun on her skin and her boy by her side.


End file.
